You have to admire chief compliance officers for their tenacity and ability to multi-task. They are the consummate jugglers of important projects, strategies and tasks. They can never completely finish their tasks – when one is finished, the list continues to grow with more to dos. Over the last few years, companies have paid more attention to third-party due diligence. As a result, companies have...
A confident person is willing to admit a mistake. An insecure person is unwilling to admit a mistake, even in the face of overwhelming evidence contrary to his or her argument. Not that my prior position was mistaken but I have argued that one of several messages in the FCPA Guidance was that companies are spending too much time, and too many resources in reviewing...
Lawyers and compliance professionals repeatedly tout the importance of an internal investigation to protecting a company from devastating consequences from an enforcement action. An internal investigation is important for the company: (1) to evaluate the facts and the potential legal consequences from the events; and (2) to demonstrate the company’s commitment to remediate any deficiencies in its internal controls and compliance program. An effective internal...
Can you imagine being the public relations director for China these days? Even in the limited world of foreign bribery, the Chinese have had a rough couple of weeks. Add the latest news to the mix and you have a recipe for a public relations nightmare. JP Morgan disclosed it may have violated the FCPA in hiring of relatives of Chinese foreign officials. They are...
People make bad decisions. Companies make bad decisions. In fairness, sometimes a bad decision is the result of a failure to act, or a failure to prioritize. We are surrounded by oxymorons in our world. I enjoy identifying them. We all know the classics – Compassionate conservatism, military intelligence, etc. In the compliance world, my favorite oxymoron is – reactive compliance. What happened to proactive...
The hottest commodity on the job market is the compliance officer. It is about time. No longer are compliance officers considered second-rate professionals, relegated to back office positions and authority. Two trends are responsible for this professional transformation – aggressive enforcement programs and corporate governance focus on risk management. It is important to recognize that these trends are not transitory in nature, they are defining...
Compliance is hard enough even when the issues are simplified, the tasks are defined, and the strategies are straightforward. It is all too easy to complicate an issue, wrap it in legalese, and technical terms which are used to justify some type of “expertise,” and then claim victory once the problem is solved. The challenge for practitioners is to communicate practical solutions to what appear...
Returning to the theme of profound grasps of the obvious, compliance officers face numerous challenges where they need creativity and persistence. One area which is not as hard as others is training. A good training program requires common sense. Here is the rocket-science question – How do you make your training program interesting? Well, the Justice Department and SEC’s FCPA Guidance provided a little bit...
As I have frequently stated, if your business is operating in China, chances are you are violating the FCPA. That sounds very cynical but there is a measure of reality to my claim. With all the recent attention from the GSK investigation in China which is rapidly extending to other drug companies, China should be on every company’s mind. There are several important aspects to...
Chief Compliance Officers are creative people. What appears insurmountable to us mere mortals and attorneys, is just another daily challenge for a CCO. It is a wonder that the compliance profession continues to grow in membership and importance in the business world. After years of neglect, CCOs have become everyone’s best friend in the corporate governance world. CEOs, COOs, CFOs and all of the acronymed-senior...
